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Sep 25, 2015

Review: NAUGHTY BITS by Joey W. Hill

Summary:

To better serve the customers of her lingerie shop, Madison must explore the pleasures of giving up control...

After inheriting her sister’s North Carolina lingerie shop, Naughty
Bits, Madison jumps at the chance to dump her boring finance career and
try her luck down South. But even before Madison can settle in, she
catches the attention of the owner of the neighboring hardware store.
Sexually dominant Logan Scott recognizes a submissive when he sees one.
And what he sees, he wants.

He presents her with three very
tempting gifts—handcuffs, erotic cards, and an open invitation to start
her sexual training. She has to accept. After all, how can she hope to
sell fantasies to lingerie customers without embracing her own? Now,
she’s about to discover just how far her fantasies can take her—and how
far Logan will go to make every one of them come true.

A few moths ago I read and reviewed Naughty Bits, and I posted the review of Part I, but before I posted the rest, real life pulled me away from the blog, and in the end it all slipped my mind. Before something else gets in the way, here are my reviews of all of Naughty Bits, Part I included.

The complete novel is available, but I've read and reviewed it part by part.

When finance
executive Madison inherits a lingerie shop called Naughty Bits, she
decides to leave behind her staid career and explore her every forbidden
desire...

Madison is a control freak with one wish—to
lose control. Her hidden submissive cravings have led to a string of
disastrous relationships. So when she inherits her sister’s North
Carolina lingerie shop, Naughty Bits, she jumps at the opportunity to
dump her boring finance career and bad history and try her luck down
South.

But before Madison can settle in, she catches the
attention of the owner of the neighboring hardware store. Sexually
dominant Logan Scott can see the hunger for command in Madison’s eyes
and is anxious to help unleash her submissive desires. He presents her
with three very tempting gifts—handcuffs, erotic cards, and an open
invitation to join him at a submissive’s training session.

Faced
with the realization that she can’t sell fantasies to her lingerie
customers without embracing her own, Madison accepts Logan’s offer. Now,
she’s about to discover just how far her desire can take her…

Review:

Rating: 3,5 stars.

A very good start of what I believe will be another amazing love story by one of my favorite romance authors.
Reading blurbs of Ms. Hill's books always leaves me wondering how
exactly the story will go, how the main characters will get together,
and most importantly how they will fall in love, but what my
imagination comes up with never comes close to the wonderfully written
tales Ms. Hill is an expert in. Madison and Logan's is no exception. The beginning of it, at least, but I'm quite confident it'll only get better from now on.

A control freak with one wish—to lose control, Madison already has me feeling bad for her,
and how could I not? Her life in general is not in a good place. She
just lost her sister. She inherited a lingerie shop which she has very
little idea how to run, and the few interactions with customers proved
that. But at least it's a sort of a new start for her,
and from what I've learned about her in this part, it's a much needed
fresh start. Her sister Alice knew that, and made sure Madison at least
gave it a chance. Alice also knew what Madison really was: a submissive,
but no matter how much she tried to get Madison to accept and embrace
that part of herself, she failed. And Madison had a string of failed
relationships because of that. This is the most interesting aspect of
Madison's life to me. I do hope to get to the bottom of her terrible
choices of men in the next parts. Why she'd deny herself
something that's she needs so much, and then date men who couldn't
possibly provide it, who even judged her for it, is beyond me. Luckily,
her sister knew her well, and left her with Logan.

Logan has me crushing on him already.
The whole part one is written from Madison's perspective and she only
just met him, so the information about him is limited, except he seems like someone saying "Yes, Sir" to would be a privilege.
No matter what Madison says, she can feel that, too. She may tell
herself she's accepting to help him train another sub for the sake of
her business, but we all know that's only an excuse. I can't wait to
continue their journey, and see what happens during that training
session.

And, yes, the Joey W. Hill magic I was hoping for to get over a depressing book is very present on these pages,
but if you're reading Naughty Bits not as a whole novel, but part by
part, be aware there's quite a few less pages of the actual story in
Part I than you'd think. It caught me off-guard, but that won't happen
again.

Fear is no match for lust in Joey W. Hill’s sexy new novella about a woman who sheds her shame to embrace her pleasure…

Madison may have ditched her well-ordered Boston life to run Naughty
Bits, her sister’s North Carolina lingerie shop, but she didn’t expect
to throw herself into such chaos—or to become intimate with the sexiest
man she’s ever had the pleasure of meeting. After spending a night
observing a submissive’s training session, Madison is ready for Logan to
teach her how to feed her own deep fantasies—and get rid of all her
lingering fears…

Madison’s aching desire to submit is unlike
anything Logan’s ever experienced before, and he’s determined to be the
man to make her relinquish control. Still, Logan’s unsure if Madison is
ready to take that first step to becoming his—until she shows up at his
door ready to be commanded. Luckily for them both, Logan’s got more than
a few surprises up his sleeve that he knows she’ll enjoy…

Review:

Rating: 4 stars.

Well,
did it just get really hot in here or what... And sweet... And
emotional... In that order. Part II left me wishing I had magic powers
so I could cast a spell to make Logan real to have for myself.

Now,
I could use this whole review space to say for the hundredth time how
much I love reading Joey W. Hill's stories, and talk about all the warm,
fuzzy feelings I get while reading them, but right now I'm short on
time. Plus, unless I'm mistaken, I've done that in all of my reviews of
Ms. Hill's books. This time, suffice it to say what I said I wish to do
with Logan's character is a common occurrence with the heroes I find in
this author's works.

At the end of Part I Madison reached a wise
and inevitable decision to take up Logan on his offer to join him
during a session with Troy, a submissive he's training, and right at the
beginning of Part II I got to enjoy reading it. And enjoy it I
did. Logan, the amazing Dom, Troy, the incredible sub, and Madison, the
eager observer. It got very hot, very fast in that room, especially when
Madison joined in the fun.

The session served
its purpose of helping Madison become more suited to run an erotica
shop, and guide her customers in the right direction. That became clear
with the visit of an interesting trio. Now, that trio is special, not just because I'm jealous of Sam for being involved with both a Dom and a sub, but because they will be the stars of the new Naughty Wishes serial coming next year. That little visit they made to the Naughty Bits
store was enough to make me want to have their story, and I couldn't be
happier Ms. Hill felt the same. I'm also wondering about Troy and his
Mistress. I haven't found them in published books, so fingers crossed
they get their own book. But I digress...

Over the course
of over twenty works, it's become abundantly clear this author's gift
in making ordinary activities highly erotic. Take this novella, for
example. A simple night watching a movie became an intense D/s session.
Madison is slowly but surely embracing her submissive side in the care
of Logan's mastery. To my chagrin, he's still an enigma. What exactly
Alice (Madison's late sister) told him about Madison is still pretty
much unknown, as is his history and present. Not his fault, mind you.
Madison wants to keep the fantasy for a little while longer. I do hope
she gets over that soon, because I want to know more. Madison is also
prepared for more--a session involving pain. Oh, I can't wait!

After inheriting her sister's North Carolina lingerie shop, Madison is discovering how delicious it can be to lose control...thanks
to her master's exquisite skills. Logan is committed to awakening
Madison’s long buried desires, and after he shows her the depths of
ecstasy they can reach with a little bit of roleplay, he’s ready to take
her to the next level.But when Madison’s old fears resurface, Logan
grows wary of pushing her too far too fast. He can sense just how
deeply she longs for release from past regrets, but what surprises him
the most is the intense yearning his innocent new sub is awakening in
him. Now Logan must decide to what lengths he’ll go to convince Madison
to give herself over completely…

Review:

Rating: 3.5 stars.

Part II of Naughty Bits gave an idea what the third part would be about: it promised this time some pain would be mixed with pleasure in Bound to Please, and it delivered. Madison enjoyed it more than she expected, and I enjoyed reading about it, but that was no surprise at all. ;) Those
scenes are amongst those I look forward to most in this author's books,
because she writes them so well, so well I find myself disappointed
when the Dom/Domme in question doesn't have a sadistic side.
Logan seems to have one; I just wish he'd unleash it more often. But I
understand that would not be the right way with Madison, with all her
issues and all. However, she did discover she's more of a masochist than
she imagined in that session that pulled unexpected reactions out of
her.All in all, I liked that part, but there was just one thing that didn't go as well as I had hoped. Sex.
To be clear, it wasn't that the sex was bad. Far from it. It was more
that after so much build-up, I expected more than what I read. It was
kind of anticlimactic. However, the second time was much, much,
much better. That entire last scene was amazing--sweet, emotional,
hot--all in one. It also gave a glimpse of what is to come in the
fourth, last part: enacting Madison's auction fantasy. It should be
good.

But before all that happened, there were two more significant parts in the story.First
was when Madison came face to face to Veronica, a woman in an abusive
relationship with a violent asshole posing as a "Master". It's
easy to forget the harsh reality has those people lurking around when
I'm reading about these incredible male specimens that are the heroes in
Ms. Hill's books. In that situation Logan once again proved his worth,
underscoring once again to Madison what a good man he is. The second was Madison trying out the Mistress role with Troy.
A hot teacher disciplining a misbehaving student--fun times. But as fun
as it was, it was not not enough. Madison realized who and what she
was, so it was well worth it. Plus, it gave a glimpse in the
relationship between Troy and Shale.

To understand her
customers’ desires at her lingerie store, Naughty Bits, Madison has been
exploring her own deep yearnings with the help of neighboring store
owner—and oh-so-sexy Dominant—Logan. After overcoming her fears and
allowing herself to truly submit, Madison is ready for her ultimate
sexual adventure: an auction where she’ll be offered up to the highest
bidding Master.

But when her fantasy brings her face-to-face with
her true feelings for Logan, she’ll have to figure out if she’s ready
to trust her heart as well as her body to him forever…

Review:

Rating: 3 stars.

The
final part in the serial revolving around Madison, a woman whose seven
failed relationships had left her with a ton of intimacy issues, is
about finally getting past them, letting go of the past, and AT LAST
accepting Logan for what he truly is: her Master. I say "at
last" because Madison had started to become frustrating for one simple
reason: seven times she had given herself to a wrong man, but now that
the right one came along (and she knows he's the right one), she keeps
backing away. Silly woman. I mean, hellooo! I guess she thought him to
be too good to be true. I think it's a shame he's fictional, but what
can you do...

The Highest Bid was about making fantasies come true.
Not mine, sadly, but Madison's. Early on she confessed to Logan her
recurring fantasy of being trained as a sex slave, and then sold at an
auction to a soldier who she secretly wished for. I admit this part wasn't my favorite.
This type of auction, whether real or fantasy, is not something I enjoy
reading about, and Logan did a very good job at making it seem real.
Scarily so. I did like the part leading to the "auction", but the rest
kind of freaked me out a bit. Like I said, this isn't my thing. However,
it is Madison's, and Madison is what this was all about. For her this
appeared to be the right way to go to get her to finally understand
Logan is there to stay, so it was well worth it. The HEA was achieved! (At seventy-something percent.)

All in all, reading Naughty Bits was enjoyable, as was to be expected given Joey W. Hill is one of my favorite authors.
As per usual with this type of serials where we have one novel split
into several parts, I think I did the right thing by reading them all
one right after the other. I can't help but think it would have been
even better had I not even stopped to review each one after finishing
them. Maybe, I don't know. What I do know is that the way the
parts were written worked, but I still do prefer when Ms. Hill writes
those really long novels. I also missed having the hero's perspective, especially since the hero was someone like Logan. No matter, this worked well enough for me to look forward to Naughty Wishes.

Oh, I have it over quite a few books, so no judgement here. Whenever you're in the mood, you'll have plenty to choose from. Also, rights to some of her books were reverted to her, so they were republished, and now cost significantly less, which is a plus. :)